Articles and nouns

What you will practice

• Use le, la, l', and les with the right gender and number.
• Choose un, une, and des, and the partitive du or de la.
• Replace an indefinite or partitive article with de after negation.

Explanation

Definite articles

The definite article marks a particular noun, or a noun used in general. le is masculine singular: le livre. la is feminine singular: la table. Before a vowel sound, or a mute h, both become l': l'ami, l'école, l'hôtel. The plural article is les for every gender: les livres, les tables. Gender belongs to the noun, not to the English translation. Learn each article with its noun.

Indefinite and partitive

The indefinite article means one item of a type: un livre for masculine, une table for feminine, and des livres in the plural. A mass, something you are not counting as separate items, takes the partitive. Masculine mass nouns take du, as in du pain. Feminine ones take de la, as in de la soupe. Before a vowel, the partitive is de l': de l'eau. du is de joined to le.

Negation

When negation applies to an indefinite or partitive object, that article becomes de. J'ai du pain becomes Je n'ai pas de pain. J'ai des livres becomes Je n'ai pas de livres, so plural des becomes de. un and une change the same way: Je n'ai pas de voiture. Before a vowel, write d': Je n'ai pas d'amis. A definite object can keep le or la. This rule is about un, des, and the partitive.

Examples

1. le livrethe book
2. l'écolethe school
3. du painsome bread
4. une tablea table
5. Je n'ai pas de pain.I do not have any bread.

Common mistakes

• le table uses the wrong gender. table is feminine: la table.
• Some words that start with h keep le or la. hôtel is not one of them: write l'hôtel.